A new bridge over a ravine and railroad bed in North Irwin could be built in two years if plans hold true, a PennDOT official said this past week.

The Fourth Street Bridge has been closed for a decade and was removed last year. As some residents await its replacement, others aren’t looking forward to the increase in traffic it could bring because it would reconnect the borough to Route 993 in North Huntingdon.

Construction on the new Fourth Street Bridge is not expected to start until 2026, said Gary Barber, acting assistant for design for PennDOT’s district that includes Westmoreland County. The project is in the preliminary engineering stage, and the state does not anticipate advertising for bids until 2025, Barber said when contacted at his Uniontown office.

A 124-foot-long, 34-foot-wide single span steel girder bridge with a 6-foot shoulder for pedestrians is proposed by PennDOT. It would connect Fourth Street with Broadway Avenue Extension.

North Irwin residents and officials who have waited for funding for the bridge found solace in a visit by officials this past week when they said some federal funding has been secured for the project.

U.S. Rep. Summer Lee, facing a tough Democratic primary battle on April 23, joined local and county officials Thursday to announce $500,000 in funding from the federal transportation budget.

“It gives us better access to Trafford and Monroeville” along Route 993, said Sue Kochman, president of North Irwin Council, during ceremonies held in front of what is a gaping hole over the Norfolk Southern Corp. railroad tracks.

The 140-foot-long wood deck bridge that had carried traffic since about 1900 was razed in May because of its deteriorating condition, Kochman said.

For now, the main link to Irwin and North Huntingdon is down a steep and bumpy roadway that Bill Bozzick, North Irwin’s public works director, refers to as Brickyard Road because it is made of bricks. The name on the maps is First Street.

Because the project has been in the works for so long, the estimated price of a new structure has increased from about $2 million nine years ago to an estimated $4 million now, said Vaughn Neill, Westmoreland County engineer.

The federal government is paying the lion’s share of the cost — about 80%. Norfolk Southern, which inherited the bridge from the old Pennsylvania Railroad, typically pays about 10% of the cost of a new bridge, Neill said. The county would cover the remainder of the costs.

Without the bridge in place, it takes North Irwin firefighters longer to respond to an emergency to houses on the other side of the bridge, said Glenn Geiger, North Irwin fire chief.

“It’s extra minutes. It’s lives and property, and minutes matter” when responding to a fire, Geiger said.

The new bridge might save as much as two minutes when North Irwin responds to a fire in Larimer or Ardara, both in North Huntingdon, said Adam Gogets, North Irwin deputy fire chief.

“It’ll save valuable minutes,” Gogets said.

That’s the same for Irwin police or firefighters who are responding in case of an emergency in North Irwin, Irwin Mayor Jeff Clem said.

Not everyone in North Irwin was thrilled with the prospect of a new bridge.

“My parents (Kim and Glenn Francis) would not like to have it opened because of the traffic that will go by,” said Isaiah Francis, who lives about 100 yards from where the bridge once spanned the steep ravine with railroad tracks at the bottom.

Chad Youngbauer, whose South Side Road home in North Huntingdon is about a quarter-mile from where the bridge was, said other than the occasional times when Brush Creek floods Route 993 and strands them on the hill, he does not want the bridge rebuilt.

“People would speed by here. When it was opened, you could not get out of your driveway,” said Youngbauer, who has lived in the neighborhood all his life.

When it does reopen, Youngbauer said he will ask North Huntingdon to install speed bumps on the road to slow the drivers.

“You get kind of used to it not having the traffic,” said Raymond Youngbauer, who has lived on South Side Road for 51 years.

But when it was opened, vehicles came “rip-roaring” down the hill to Route 993, Youngbauer said. “No one paid attention to the speed limit (25 mph).”

Another South Side Road resident, Pat Mohan, said he had mixed feelings about the rebuilding the bridge. For the past decade, the only traffic on the road was from residents and workers in nearby plants.

“I’m torn about it,” said Mohan, who lived there for seven years before the bridge closed.

A couple living in the house closest to the former bridge had differing opinions on the rebuild.

“It will be nice to have access to North Irwin. It will confuse delivery drivers a little less,” Emily Trafalski said.

Her husband, Justin, said he likes living on a dead-end street.

“It’s quiet,” he said.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was updated April 1, 2024 to correct the spellings of North Irwin fire chief Glenn Geiger and deputy chief Adam Gogets.

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